I. The angel and thealtar. It is the altar that stood in the holy place that is here referred to in the third verse, not the brazen altar; it is the golden altar, the altar of incense; the altar of prayer and praise; the altar at which the priests ministered, and where also blood was sprinkled. In what respects it differed from the mercy-seat (at the place of prayer) does not quite appear. At this altar all who are God’s priests, all His royal priesthood, officiate. Here specially they stand, as pleaders with God, as intercessors on behalf of His own or against His enemies. To this altar the angel comes (not one of the seven), and here he takes his stand for a special purpose.
II. The angel and the censer. He comes to act as priest; a priestly messenger from God.
III. The angel and the incense. It is no empty censer that he holds; it is not for show that he waves it. Incense is there; incense not his, butsupplied by another, though by whom is not said. “There was given him.” It is much incense, or, literally, “many incenses,” out of which were to come innumerable wreaths of fragrant smoke.
IV. The angel and the fire. The angel having emptied the censer of its incense, fills it with fire; the pouring out of the one from the censer being the signal for the coming in of the other into that vessel from which the incense had been poured out.
1. Prayer remains often long unanswered. The reasons for the long delay are often far beyond our reach; but in the end they will be found infinitely wise and gracious.
2. Prayer is not lost. It lies on “the golden altar which is before the throne.” We lay each petition there, as we say, “for Christ’s sake.”
3. Prayer will be answered. Delay will only add to the fulness of the answer, and increase our joy when it comes. And it will come. He is faithful that promised. He cannot deny Himself.
4. The answer will come in connection with Christ’s surpassing excellence. His fragrance is to be cast upon these long-lying prayers, that seem without life or motion, and they shall arise.
5. Prayer is often answered in ways we little thought of. (H. Bonar, D. D.)
Our prayers presented in heaven
I. The employment in which pious men are stated to engage.
1. Prayer is the habit by which pious men on earth are always prominently distinguished. There is not one in the universe of our intelligent race who is not under obligation to pray. While men in the alienation of unconverted nature violate the obligation, and indulge in passions and in habits which are utterly incompatible with its performance, men on the other hand, who have been the subject of renovating influence, are, from the moment of receiving it, imbued with the principles and with the instincts of prayer.
2. Prayer thus distinguishing pious men is directed for important and comprehensive objects. It commonly hasrespect to temporal objects, craving the communication of temporal benefits. But these must always be secondary, and should be desired with a reservation to the Divine wisdom as to whether it will be for our well-being or for our disadvantage to receive them. And then the prayers of the saints, when rightly offered, must not merely be personal, directed to their own welfare, but intercessory, directed to the welfare of others.
3. Prayer thus distinguishing pious men, and directed for important and comprehensive objects, is always attended by peculiar characteristics--humility; a deep conviction of insignificance in the presence of a God so great, and of impurity in the presence of a God so holy.
II. The manner in which that employment is commended before God. An angel is represented as coming and standing at the altar; “and there was given unto him much incense,” etc.
1. Observe, first, the person. There is satisfactory evidence to identify the Saviour with the angel who is here presented to us. It is He who takes the prayers of the saints and presents them before the throne.
2. Notice the station. He is represented as coming and standing at the altar, “having a golden censer,” and the altar, moreover, is described as “the golden altar.” The Jewish priest could not stand by the altar of incense unless he had first of all offered an atonement for sin: and when there is a vision of our Lord Jesus as the High Priest of our profession standing by the golden altar, the necessary assumption is, that He too had first offered an atonement for sin.
3. Observe the act. It is stated that there was given to Him much incense, that He might offer it, with the prayers of all saints, upon the golden altar which was before the throne. Here, then, is the exercise of the Saviour’s office of Intercessor in identification with the prayers of the saints; and it is a most sublime and a most thrilling thought, that there is no prayer offered in humility, faith, and earnestness, for objects which are coincident with theWord of God, but what is borne upward and presented by the Saviour before the throne of the heavenly Father. And whether prayer be offered in the midnight darkness or in the noontide light--whether prayer be offered in the secret chamber or in the public assembly--whether prayer be offered in the mansion or in the cottage, in the prison-house or in the palace, in the tropics or at the poles, it rises upward, becomes interwoven and identified with the much incense of the Saviour’s merits, and so penetrates into the very holiest of all.
III. The result in which the employment so commended must terminate.
1. The success of the prayers of the saints is invariable. The success of the prayers presented on this occasion is indicated by the expression that “the smoke of the furnace ascended up before God out of the angel’s hand.” The ascent of the prayers, mingled with the incense, out of the hand of the angel before God is intended to signify its acceptance. May we not deduce this fact from the Divine nature of our Redeemer? Is not His will one with the will of the Father? and must not what He deigns to present in Hiscondescension as Mediator before the Father be accepted by the Father in connection with Himself? Then, again, may not this fact be deduced from the value of the atonement which He has offered upon the Cross? Is that defective? Is that presented with doubt and uncertainty in the presence-chamber of the celestial palace? Has it not been sealed by His resurrection from the dead, and by His ascension into heaven and His enthronement in royalty there? Is it possible for the Intercessor to plead His atonement in vain? Then, again, this fact may also be deduced directly from the express declaration of the Sacred Writings.
2. The success of the prayers of the saints shall be manifest. “The angel took the censer and filled it with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth: and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake”--physical signs and convulsions pronouncing “Amen “to the one delightful truth. (J. Parsons.)
Christ’s work of intercession in heaven
I. It is a work for the performance of which he isdivinely commissioned. “Another angel,” it is said, “came and stood at the altar.” Who this angel was we are not indeed expressly told. However, the work in which the angel who came and stood by the altar engaged, was proper only to one person--to Him who is the High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus. He is another angel, not only distinct from the seven before mentioned who stood before God, but different from them in kind, having obtained by inheritance a more excellent name than they; yet He participates in their name, too, as being like them a commissioned minister of Jehovah. He glorified not Himself to be made an High Priest, but was called of God, as was Aaron. Of Him, as well as of the Spirit, it may be said that He maketh intercession for the saints, according to the will of God. His mediation in all its parts is the discharge of a trust committed to Him by that very Being against whom we had rebelled.
II. It is a work for the performance of which He is amply furnished, having the golden censer and much incense given Him to offer. When it is said that there was given to Him much incense, we are not to conceive that the offering was not of that whichwas His own. In accordance with the symbolical rite to which the vision is accommodated, it might seem to be put into His hands by another. But this act can have reference only to the assignment to Him of His office, or to His being endowed with all requisite qualifications for its discharge. A body was prepared for Him. The Holy Spirit was given Him not by measure. The incense was thus provided, which He was, as it were, to kindle and make to rise to God in sweet odour by His voluntary humiliation.
III. It is a wore which insures the acceptance of the prayers that are offered in His name, and for the blessings of His salvation. The first sincere prayer for mercy and grace which is intrusted to this great High Priest, in the faith that He will bring it with acceptance before the throne, makes the distinction between the sinner who has no part in Him, and the man who, by giving himself to Christ, has been numbered with His saints. He doubtless intercedes for many who yet know not His name, nor have trusted in His grace; and it is owing to His interposition on their behalf that they are not cut off in their sins, but in His time brought to the knowledge of the truth, and to the faith of God’s elect. There is also, we may admit, a direct intercession of Christ for His people, asking for them blessings besides or beyond what they are led to ask for themselves. We often know not what we ought to pray for, what would be really good for us; but He knows what things we have need of; and whatever is necessary to their complete restoration to holiness and happiness, will be included in His requests for those who have an interest in His mediation. But we may learn from the representation here given, that that mediation is not to be conducted in such a way as to dispense with their own prayers.
IV. This work He carries on in behalf of all His saints. No prayer that rises from earth reaches the throne of grace but that which He presents. But none that is offered in His name is forgotten or omitted in the ministrations of this great High Priest. His understanding is infinite. There is room in His heart for all that will come to seek refuge there; among the unnumbered millions that may look to Him for pity and help, and commit their cause to Him, there is not one for whom He will not interest Himself as much as if his case alone engaged His sympathy. (J. Henderson, D. D.)
Practical lessons drawn from the doctrine of Christ’s intercession
I. It should impress us with a deep sense of the evil of sin. That there is involved in every act of it such daring presumption, and base ingratitude, and brutish folly, and foul malignity, as could not, but for the much incense offered with them by the exalted High Priest, have been otherwise than as a smoke in his nostrils, fire burning all the day, rendering our prayers and services offensive to Him who sitteth on the throne, provoking the eyes of His glory.
II. It affords us the richest encouragement in prayer. Are you only willing to come to God by Christ, to owe all the blessings you need to His mediation with Him whom you had offended? He is ready to intercede for you, and we know that “Him the Father heareth always.” Often has the voice of human eloquence been roused in behalf of the wretched in vain. It has pleaded the woes and wrongs of the oppressed, to hearts so hardened in selfishness and cruel in hate as to be callous to the most pathetic appeals; but the pleadings of this great Advocate are never unsuccessful. The justice and the mercy of God unite in conceding all that He asks.
III. It shows us how vain and superstitious it is to trust in departed saints or in angels to intercede for us. Whatever may be our speculations or conjectures as to the acquaintance, which saints in glory, or our departed friends in particular, may have with things done on earth, or the interest they may yet take in our affairs; however fondly we may dream at times that they may be employed, as we are told angels are, in some ministrations in behalf of those whom they have left in this vale of tears, let us feel assured that we need no other advocate with theFather in His holy place on high than Jesus Christ the righteous. Upon Him alone let us depend, to Him directly let us go, and say, in opposition to those who would point us to other intercessors, “To whom else should we go?--He hath the words of eternal life.”
IV. The faith of Christ’s intercession should contribute to render us decided and undaunted in confessing His name and in doing the work to which He calls. Surely you have nothing to apprehend of ultimate loss or injury in the service of this exalted Redeemer! For though you should have to suffer a while for His name’s sake, or after His example, it is that when His glory shall be revealed, ye also may be glad with exceeding joy. And while you have committed to Him the keeping of your souls, you need not fear for aught that may be coming on the earth. He will keep you from the hour of temptation which shall come upon all the world. Does He not pray for this, not that you should be taken out of the world ere you have fulfilled the course allotted for you, but that you should be kept from the evil, that your faith may not fail, that you may be sanctified through the truth revealed in God’s Word, and so fitted to dwell with Him at last in the mansions He hath gone to prepare for you in His Father’s house. You need not in any case tremble for the interests of His Church; amid the agitations which seem to threaten the overthrow of all human institutions, and the convulsions which shake and affright the nations, these are secure under the protection of her exalted Head. (J. Henderson, D. D.)
Christ’s incense perfuming the prayers of all saints
I. All the saints are devout and praying persons. This is plainly intimated in the text, where we read of the prayers of all saints. It is an essential part of their character as saints to be so. It is a branch of their daily business to pray to God. The history of the saints shows this. Ever since God hath had a people in the world they have been described as men that “called upon the name of the Lord”; as “the generation of them that seek Him.” It is said that “every one that is godly seeketh the Lord.” The lives of good men in later ages show this. They all practised devotion and recommended it to others. The saints esteem it highly reasonable in itself, that as dependent creatures they should own their dependence upon God; that, as needy creatures, they should seek a supply of their wants from Him; that as sinful creatures they should implore His mercy; and as weak creatures should beg grace to help in time of need.
II. There are many imperfections attending the prayers of the saints. This is implied in the text, where we read of “much incense” being offered with them. It is supposed they were sincere; else they could not be the prayers of saints, nor would incense have been added to them. But the addition of the incense plainly intimates that they were imperfect and polluted, and of themselves unfit to be received by a pure and holy God.
III. It is the intercession ofChrist which renders the prayers of saints acceptable to God. These Christians prayed themselves, and Christ, having the golden censer full of incense, intimates that He prayed likewise, offering His own prayers with theirs and for them. He seconds and enforces their petitions. He intercedes that those sinful defects which cleave to their prayers may be pardoned and excused, and their imperfect services accepted of God. These prayers of Christ are enforced by a just, proper, and effectual plea; even His own merit, His perfect righteousness and obedience, even unto death, which are so pleasing to God, that, on that account, He grants mercy to men. His intercession is founded on what He hath done and suffered; so that He hath a just claim to be heard, asking nothing but what He hath already purchased for His people, and God, by His promise and covenant, stands engaged to bestow. Now to this intercession of Christ it is owing that the prayers of the saints are acceptable to God. Application:
1. They who do not make a serious business of prayer are not saints.
2. The intercession of Christ will not excuse the neglect of prayer, or the allowed defects of it.
3. How glorious and how amiable doth Christ appear as an intercessor!
4. What deep humility becometh the greatest saints.
5. Let us fix our dependence on the intercession of Christ for the acceptance of our prayers. (Job Orton, D. D.)
Fire of the altar.
Fire from the altar
Fire is the great consumer. It always bespeaks wrath, torture, and destruction to the wicked. It is the common figure of Divine terribleness toward the guilty--one of the great agents in the administrations of the great day. And when the sublime Priest-Angel of heaven turns His fire-filled censer on the earth, we have come to the day that shall burn as an oven, in the which all the proud and ungodly shall be as stubble to the devouring flames (Mal_4:1). This fire is taken from the altar. It is one of the fearful characteristics of God’s gracious operations, that they heighten the damnation of the disobedient and the unbelieving. It is not Adam’s guilt, for there is full remedy in Christ against that. It is not the condemnation in which the gospel finds them, for it comes with a full and everlasting reprieve. But here is the mischief--that when the great and costly salvation of God is carried to them they despise it and make light of it, and go their way as if it were nonsense or nothing. Out of the very altar of sacrifice, therefore, comes their damnation. It is the saving word refused, which is a savor of death unto death in them that perish. Perdition is simply abused or perverted grace. It is the same censer, filled with the same ingredients, only turned dawnward in the case of those who believe not. (J. A. Seiss, D. D.)
